‘Ayisha said the postman was in her mummy’s bed,’ Stella said.
Mae puffed out her cheeks. ‘Making a delivery, I guess.’
‘What was he delivering?’
‘His package,’ Felix said.
Mae aimed an elbow at him.
‘I think Selena has made people crazy,’ Sail said.
‘Or maybe she’s set them free,’ Felix said. ‘Like now, take what I’m about to do. I’d never have had the balls to do it before. I mean, if we weren’t going to die in the next –’
‘I’m just glad it doesn’t involve fire this time,’ Mae said.
‘But it does involve Felix dressed up like a zombie?’ Sail said, a question in his tone.
Felix shrugged. ‘She rented the Walking Dead box set.’ Mae sighed. ‘If that doesn’t imply a deep attraction to zombies, then I don’t know what does.’
She had helped with the costume. They’d taken a pair of scissors to Felix’s best shirt and trousers while Stella helped paint his face, using her fingers, tracing the lines.
‘So this is what it feels like to be white,’ Felix said, looking at his reflection in the window of a parked car.
‘How does it feel?’ Mae asked.
‘Entitled. Even as a zombie.’
Mae handed Stella a bottle of ketchup.
‘More by the mouth,’ Mae said.
‘Not in the mouth,’ Felix said, coughing.
When they were done he led them up Ocean Drive.
‘Is he doing the walk?’ Stella said.
‘Afraid so,’ Mae replied.
Felix limped, one shoulder dipped, his left foot dragging behind him.
‘He should do the noise.’
Felix groaned.
They stopped by the open gates at the end of Candice’s driveway. Mae handed Felix the sign.
CANDICE, USE YOUR BRAINS
GO TO THE FINAL WITH ME.
‘I’m scared,’ Felix said.
Sail cupped Felix’s face in his hands and spoke to him, nose to nose. ‘This is it. Two weeks to fulfil your destiny. I know you’re nervous, it’s natural. But you’re the Reverend’s son. When he talks, you can see the housewives stirring. The apple and the tree, Felix. His blood is coursing your veins. So channel him, lurch down that driveway and groan your heart out. And when she hears that beautiful mating call, she’ll march out and finish ripping those clothes from your body.’ He planted a gentle kiss on Felix’s forehead and then nodded.
Felix nodded back.
‘So romantic,’ Stella said, clapping her hands.
‘You really think this will work?’
‘I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life,’ Sail said, wiping his hands on his jeans.
They stood there, fingers crossed, nervous for him as he walked down her driveway and disappeared from sight.
And then they heard the scream.
Followed by the deafening sound of a rape alarm.
The zombie came sprinting from the drive. ‘Liam’s got a gun. He’s got an actual gun.’
‘She had to chase him with her brother’s airgun. Zombie rape, man. I tell you, there’s some terrifying people in this town,’ Hunter said.
‘Are you sure he was trying to rape her?’ Mae said.
‘No doubt. He was making weird sex groans.’
It was midnight.
Hunter wore black jeans and a dark hooded top. She’d tied her hair back. On her feet were monochrome black Converse and beneath each eye was a streak of warpaint. Mae had laughed so hard Hunter almost turned and left her.
‘After this we’re even,’ Hunter said.
‘Okay, commando.’
They walked up Ocean Drive in silence and stopped by the Prince house. The gates had been taken down to make room for more machinery.
The house lay in darkness, Hugo and his father in the city. ‘We’ll take the Range Rover,’ Hunter said. ‘I can handle an auto no problem.’
They walked up to the front door of the house and Mae took the coat hanger from her bag, straightened it and twisted the end into a hook.
Hunter kept watch.
Mae dropped to her knees and pushed the wire through the letterbox. The keys were on the side table, right where they’d been the night she broke in.
‘Hurry up,’ Hunter hissed.
It took five attempts before she knocked everything to the floor.
‘Like a cat burglar,’ Hunter said.
Mae pulled the wire carefully from the door, then grinned when she saw the keys hooked to the end.
They walked over to the black Range Rover and Hunter pressed the key fob.
Lights flashed behind them.
Mae glanced at Hunter.
Hunter glanced at Mae.
And there in front of them, in the glass-walled garage, they saw the gleaming red Ferrari.
‘No way,’ Hunter said. ‘He would kill us. I mean actually kill us dead. That thing is going in the bunker.’
‘We could take your father’s car?’
‘Even worse.’
‘We’ve come this far.’
‘Did you not hear me? That car is going in the bunker instead of the dozen family members he could fit in there instead.’
‘I saved your life.’
Hunter gritted her teeth. ‘You can’t ever use that again.’
‘Agreed.’
They walked over to it.
‘It looks scary. I don’t know if I can drive it.’
Mae shrugged. ‘It’s just a car. How hard can it be?’
The engine screamed as Hunter crunched into second and they shuddered along the driveway.
‘You sure you know how to drive?’ Mae said.
‘Sixty-five lessons,’ Hunter said, as she stalled. ‘The instructor said that was some kind of record, considering my age.’
From West they took B-roads. Hunter activated the wipers and couldn’t switch them off again.
‘Can’t believe we stole a car from Jon Prince,’ Hunter said. ‘He’s got that look in his eye, you know, like crazy. And he’s a total perv, always checking me out.’
‘Who isn’t?’ Mae said, face locked straight.
‘I know, right.’
‘Did you know Hugo’s mum?’
‘She was cool. Kind of timid, and I could tell, you know. Some days she wore heavy make-up, and it hid the bruises but not the look in her eyes.’
‘And then she left.’
‘And Hugo’s been searching for her ever since. She took a bag, but left her only child behind.’
‘She was desperate.’
‘Maybe she’ll come back for him, but the days …’
Mae watched dark fields pass by. When she was a girl they’d spilled with rapeseed, so bright, like a million fallen suns. Now they were fallow, all of them, nothing but mud baked hard by neglect and the relentless summer.
Hunter crossed the centre lines while she fussed with her hair in the rear-view mirror. Mae grabbed the wheel and kept them headed straight.
‘You see all that shit in America? That space centre. I get why they stormed it, but tearing it apart like that …’ Hunter found fourth.
‘They’re levelling.’
‘Some people are rich enough to keep living, maybe not for long, but they’ve got a chance if they leave this planet.’
‘You think that’s fair?’
‘Murder for principle, I’m not sure that’s a defence.’
‘But when there’s no one left to judge –’
‘We can only judge ourselves,’ Hunter said, watching the road.
They made it to Newport as the moon edged out a cloud and finally lit the sky.
Mae pointed and Hunter stopped in the middle of the road.
‘That’s it?’
Mae nodded. ‘That’s it.’
Hunter pulled her hood up.
The pawnshop sat in darkness, but for the small red light of a security camera. Mae pressed her face against the window and looked inside.
Front and centre, with the electrical equipment, was Sail’s laptop.
‘Can’t he just buy it back?’ Hunter said, keeping an eye on the deserted street.
Mae picked up a rock. ‘I have to do this myself. I took it, I get it back. Go start the car and be ready.’
Mae threw the rock as the engine fired.
The door was glass, she expected it to crack and shatter.
The rock bounced back.
She tried again, hurled it with a run-up. It thundered against the glass but didn’t leave a mark.
‘It’s reinforced,’ Hunter called.
‘Thank you, I didn’t realise.’
‘Such a bitch.’
She tried again, this time when it cannoned back it nearly hit her.
Hunter laughed and clapped her hands, like Mae was performing a skit for her.
And then they heard the shout as the lights from the flat above came on.
The window opened and Mae recognised the owner.
He was bare-chested, and he swore at her and then, to her horror, she saw him raise a gun and point it down. And it didn’t look like an airgun.
‘Shit,’ Hunter screamed.
Mae sprinted for the car, yanked the door open and dived into the passenger seat.
‘Go,’ she yelled.
Hunter slammed her foot down on the accelerator.
The car lunged violently backwards.
‘You’re in reverse,’ Mae shouted.
Hunter screamed again and wrestled with the steering wheel.
The car swerved as they mounted the pavement and ploughed straight into the front of the shop.
The windows caved.
Glass rained down and a cloud of dust smoked into the street.
The alarm was shrill and jarring and Mae opened the door and climbed out into the wreckage.
‘What the hell are you doing?’
Mae grabbed the laptop, and then headed to the other window and took the necklace from the display.
She climbed back in just as Hunter found first and they tore into the road.
Hunter screamed the whole way down the high street.
The tyre blew out as they reached the edge of West.
They opened both doors and pushed, Hunter with one hand in the car to steer. It was slow going. The streets were dead.
‘Maybe he’s got breakdown cover,’ Hunter said, then climbed into the car and fished through the glove box.
‘You know we can’t actually call.’
Hunter held up a small silver hip flask. She drank, smacked her lips and passed it to Mae, who did the same.
‘Ten nights,’ Hunter said, and toasted the sky.
Hunter kicked her heels off and threw them into the car. Barefoot, her hair matted down with sweat, she looked over at Mae.
‘I read that they did a survey once. They asked people what they’d do if they found out an asteroid was coming the very next day,’ Hunter said. ‘Like, if instead of giving us ten years they gave us twenty-four hours.’
‘I saw it. Two-thirds said they’d get drunk.’
‘Everyone knows that. But they never said what the other third would do.’
‘Who gives a shit, we’d be too drunk to notice.’
Hunter laughed so hard she let go of the wheel on the corner of Hooper Avenue and Cedar Road.
They watched through their fingers as it smashed into a lamp post.
‘That ought to do it,’ Hunter said.
Mae drank some more, then passed the flask to Hunter.
‘We could just dump it here,’ Hunter said.
‘There’s cameras. Better leave it where we found it, he’ll just think it’s kids. Vandals or something.’
It took half an hour to get it moving again.
They were sweating by the time they turned onto Ocean Drive.
‘You think the radio still works?’ Hunter said. ‘A night this wild needs a soundtrack.’
She slid into the seat, turned the radio on and cranked it up, despite Mae telling her to keep the noise down.
‘“Tuesday’s Gone”,’ Hunter said, closing her eyes.
‘But we’re here, right now, to see it off.’
Hunter smiled.
They pushed the car onto the driveway, stood back and surveyed the damage. The rear bumper caved in. The windscreen shattered and the bonnet folded back on itself.
‘You think he’ll notice?’ Hunter said.
‘If he’s anything like his son, maybe not.’
Hunter smiled sadly. ‘Hugo, he’s not who you see.’
‘People rarely are.’
‘He’s more. He’s everything.’
Mae gripped the laptop tightly.
They walked back down the street.
‘Thanks, Hunter,’ Mae said, quietly. ‘I didn’t think you had all that in you.’
‘There’s a lot you don’t know about me. And I guess there’s a lot I don’t know about you.’
‘I still think you’re a bitch.’
‘I still think you’re a slut.’
Mae smiled.
Hunter smiled. ‘Epic night.’
‘Totally.’